Name-address management generally includes issues such as name-to-address resolution and name-address registration. Name-to-address resolution is a procedure by which a “name” of a network resource is resolved or translated into a routable network address (i.e. a location in the network topology). In this context, name-address registration is of course the corresponding registration procedure by which the name and the assigned network address of the resource are registered in the network. The name of the resource is normally well-known to users and typically also stays the same over relatively long periods of time.
There exist many solutions that in one way or the other provide support for name-to-address resolution and registration.
The Internet community for example has via the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) defined the Domain Name System (DNS), which is described in the basic references [1-2] and updated and further developed in a multitude of additional references. DNS is a system that stores and provides information associated with domain names in a distributed database in networks such as the Internet. The DNS associates domain names with many types of information, but most importantly it provides the IP address for a given domain name. DNS makes it possible to associate easy-to-remember domain names (such as ericsson.com) with hard-to-remember IP addresses.
DNS is suitable for resources that rarely change their location, but is not adapted for mobility. Another characteristic of the DNS system is that it stores the full reachable IP address in the distributed database. This is a clear drawback from a security perspective. Dynamic DNS was defined, e.g. in reference [3], to provide better support for rapid updates of DNS, but it is still far from being suitable for keeping track of roaming resources such as mobile phones and their users.
In Public Land Mobile Network (PLMN) type of systems, and specifically in GSM and 3G cellular networks, the resolution is handled via the Home Location Register (HLR), and the Visited Location Register (VLR). Via HLR and VLR, a phone number (MS-ISDN) gets resolved into a routable E.164 address, if the phone with the MS-ISDN has registered with the cellular network. Further local mechanisms are used to route a call to the specific cell in which the phone is currently located.
The HLR and VLR have overall good performance and security support regarding name resolution in cellular systems. They are however tightly bounded to the E.164 address structure and as such does not provide an open architecture for other and/or arbitrary name and address spaces.
There is thus a general need for improved name-address management and name-to-address resolution systems.